


calamity

by paradisetrain



Category: League of Legends
Genre: Conflict Resolution, Confrontations, Fix-It, Gen, Identity Reveal, Misunderstandings, Probably ooc, Reveal, What-If, for this fic i read like 3 years ago, no beta we die like yone, what even is a league character's personality anyways
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-25
Updated: 2020-09-25
Packaged: 2021-03-07 22:21:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,878
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26645164
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/paradisetrain/pseuds/paradisetrain
Summary: Instead of being sent away by Ai, Zed remains in Aware when Shen, Kennen and Akali come to visit.They talk.
Relationships: Shen & Zed (League of Legends)
Kudos: 6





	calamity

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Discord](https://archiveofourown.org/works/6292639) by [Hikari_Murasaki](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hikari_Murasaki/pseuds/Hikari_Murasaki). 



> this begins after [chapter 19](https://archiveofourown.org/works/6292639/chapters/21973547) of discord.
> 
> i do not kid when i say the first ~200 words of this has been in my drafts for three years,,, i have loved this fic for a very long time and i always come back to it. one of my essential re-reads. i understand that many people who are subscribed to me aren't subscribed for league content. don't worry! i will have more mdzs stuff soon. let me just post this first
> 
> thanks a ton to [Hikari_Murasaki](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hikari_Murasaki/pseuds/Hikari_Murasaki) for letting me write this
> 
> happy readings!

She was about to say something else but abruptly stopped. Something seemed to have caught her attention, her eyebrows knitting together slightly.

Zed looked around. Something seemed off to him, too – as he was born here, he also had a good sense for what was happening in Aware.

“What is it?” he asked.

“I’m not sure,” she murmured, her eyes focused but distant as she reached out with her senses to try to find the disturbance. Zed watched her apprehensively. Aware was a place purely under Ai’s control – not even the Seventh could approach her here.

But Zed could also sense it now – three approaching presences headed for Aware without Ai’s invitation. He raised his guard, expecting some incoming calamity or a fight with some demon-level entity.

What appeared was arguably worse.

Two humans. One yordle.

“Shredder?!”

* * *

The sight of Shredder in the flesh, in front of both Akali and Shen, filled Kennen with satisfaction. “See! I wasn’t making him up! This is Shredder!” he cried, looking up at Akali. “Still think he’s imaginary?”

Akali looked at Kennen, then Shredder, then Kennen again. “Kennen,” she said slowly. “Why is your Shredder having a smoke with some woman while in the realm of the extremely powerful entity we were going to meet?”

Kennen’s eyes widened as he finally registered what was happening. “You’re right! Shredder, why are you here?” he asked.

Shredder seemed conflicted. His strange golden eyes kept flicking behind Kennen – to Shen, for some reason. He sighed, turning to the woman next to him. Kennen marvelled at how similar their appearances were – especially those strange golden eyes.

“I suppose there’s no point keeping secrets any longer, huh?” he asked. His question was directed at the woman, but his gaze is elsewhere.

“Your choice,” she replied tonelessly. “It doesn’t affect me.

Shredder nodded. “What am I doing in Aware, you ask?” he said to Kennen. “I’m having a chat with my mother. This is Ai, First of the Seven Demon Clan.”

* * *

“You told Master you could not remember your parents,” Shen stated quietly.

Zed scoffed. “I lied. Can you imagine how your master would have reacted? He would have slaughtered me as soon as he found out I was literally _demon spawn_. Will you condemn me for wanting to live?”

“I do not want to condemn you,” Shen said, and Zed almost took it to heart. “Your lie gave me a brother. I do not condemn you,” he repeated.

A thick feeling threatened to burst out of his chest at the word _brother_ , but Kennen got there first.

“Do you two know each other or something? What is going on?” he cried.

“I apologise,” Zed murmured. “There is one more secret I haven’t told you. Kennen, my real name is Zed. You can stop calling me Shredder now.”

“Zed?” Kennen exclaimed at the same time Akali shouted, “The Master of Shadows?”

Ai pinched the bridge of her nose and sighed.

* * *

“Eye of Twilight,” Ai intoned, “Why do you see me? A demon? The antithesis of all you stand for?”

“Master did not mention you were a demon,” Shen answered. “Something is stirring in the spirit realm. I sought to know what it is.”

Ai was silent while she stirred her tea. “And why should I tell you, Eye?”

“There is no reason. I simply hope you will.”

Ai regarded Shen carefully. “My son cares about you,” she said, and Zed ducked his chin. “I cannot understand care, but he is mortal enough to do so. Zed, does he deserve to know?”

“Just tell him the inevitable truth, Ai,” he sighed.

“Very well,” Ai agreed. “Eye, I will say this once. The Clan is stirring. All the demons are awakening and becoming active – even the Seventh. There is Calamity on the horizon, Eye of Twilight, and it is inevitable. Your precious equilibrium can’t be preserved eternally.”

“That’s not a threat, that’s a fact,” Zed said quietly as he saw Akali open her mouth to protest. “Balance is stagnancy. The world is ever-changing. You can’t keep balance forever.”

“Is that what you thought that whole time?” Shen asked.

“Yes.”

Shen shook his head. “I cannot accept that. That my life’s work – that generations of my family’s lives – have been dedicated to a pointless task.”

“I know,” Zed replied. “I wasn’t asking you to.” He stood up. “I should leave. Kennen, if I see you again, I can give you those photos – if you still want them. Akali – Kennen said my Death’s Dance may be faster than yours. I sincerely hope that is not the case. Train hard; I wish you well. Shen—” he swallowed. “Despite everything, I am glad to see you well. It was an honour to be your brother, no matter how briefly.”

He turned away.

“Zed,” Shen called, and Zed stopped dead in his tracks, the Master of Shadows called to heel by a single syllable. “I do not consider you my enemy.”

Zed paused. “You should,” he eventually said.

“I shouldn’t,” Shen disagreed. “Do you remember the boy who could never stop thinking of his master as his father, even when he was scolded for it?”

Zed remembered.

When Shen turned twelve, Kusho decided he was old enough to not need a father anymore, and told him from then on, he would be Master Kusho to both of them. But Shen couldn’t stop thinking of his master as his father _._ He would refer to him as ' _father'_ , and then stop to correct himself.

Shen was never one for change.

“I remember.”

“That boy also had a brother,” Shen continued. “They grew up and grew apart, and _terrible_ things happened—,” here, Zed flinched, “—but that boy, now a man, never stopped regarding you as a brother."

“Shen,” Zed breathed. “I have done – terrible things –.”

“As have I,” Shen rebuts. “What are heroes, if not monsters who fight in the light?”

“Stop,” he said weakly. “I cannot – Ai? What –.”

Aware was closing itself off, trapping Zed inside. “What are you doing?”

Ai exhaled, a plume of smoke billowing skywards. “I thought you would not listen, but perhaps you could be persuaded to. So, I’m locking you in here until you two talk about the important thing,” she said. “Eye of Twilight, my son killed your father. How do you respond?”

Shen looked down. “At first… I was angry,” he said. “That day was chaotic. My brother had betrayed me. I was furious with him. And then I was confused – why did he betray me? Was our brotherhood all faked? Was he ever even my friend? I wanted to talk to him, to understand him. To know, from his perspective, what happened that day.”

“And now he is here,” Ai finished for him.

“He is,” Shen agreed. “Zed, what happened that day?”

He could lie, Zed thought, except he couldn’t. Not only did Aware make people franker and more indifferent, but Ai had also somehow, sneakily, slipped a truth serum in his tea.

What a cunning demon.

“There was a box,” Zed began, “Which hadn’t been opened for two hundred years. I opened it and unleashed the Shadow, the Fifth. Your father came to stop me, so I killed him. And then I left.”

“How did you kill him?” Shen asked warily.

Zed shook his head. “I don’t know.”

Shen, Akali and Kennen all looked at him in confusion, but Ai sat forward and narrowed her eyes. “You don’t remember how you killed him?”

“No,” Zed admitted.

“Child,” she said slowly, “You inherited a demon’s memory. You should remember everything.”

“Maybe it inherited wrong,” he replied, but even he knows it’s a weak rebuttal. He knew where Ai was going with her deduction, and he didn’t want to hear it.

“Zed, I asked you this earlier, but I will ask you again. Have you ever given Kamala control?”

“Never!”

“Has he ever taken control?”

Zed stopped dead. “I don’t know.”

Ai spread her palms. “Well, there you are. Now you know what happened.”

Shen frowned. “What do you mean?”

“Kamala is the Fifth, the Shadow,” Ai explained. “Demons have perfect memory. Demon possession leaves gaps in memory. Zed is a demon with a gap in his memory. Put two and two together.”

“Half-demon,” Zed mutters, but he knows Ai has a point.

“You mean, the Fifth possessed him and killed the previous Eye?” Akali exclaimed as she finally worked it out.

“No!” Zed shook his head. “That can’t be. It was my fault, I’m the one who killed him. I’m the one who screwed everything up. Your thinking is wrong – the gap in my memory could be due to something else – it doesn’t have to be demon possession.”

“Child,” Ai said, “is that you or the angst speaking?”

Zed stilled, his brows knitting together in thought.

“It… wasn’t me?” he murmured disbelievingly. He looked up at Shen, who didn’t look nearly as conflicted as Zed thought he would. “Do you believe her? That it wasn’t me?”

“It’s why I wanted to find you,” Shen responded quietly. “To ask you. Despite your differences, I didn’t believe you hated Master Kusho so much you would… kill him.”

“He did not,” Ai interrupted. “This plot has Kamala’s wily claws all over it. It’s a wonder you didn’t realise sooner – child, are you a genius or not?”

Poor Zed looked like a panicked deer. “I… what? I don’t…”

“Zed,” Shen called softly. “I forgive you. I’d like to be brothers again. Do you want that too?”

Zed looked at him incredulously. “After all I’ve done? I don’t deserve –”

“It doesn’t matter what you deserve. Do you want to or do you not?”

Too soft. Shen was always too soft.

“I do.”

Kennen wiped a tear from his eye. Ai gave Zed an awkward pat on the back. “Eye, as thanks for helping my son realise how much of an idiot he was being, I will answer your questions. Ask away.”

Shen didn’t hesitate to begin to speak.

* * *

Calamity, Ai had called it. A smudge on the horizon, but ever approaching. A culmination of chaotic energy which would plunge Runeterra into a nightmare.

She told them it was fate and fate was inevitable.

Shen refused to believe it.

Zed gazed at the strange tint of an Aware sunset. He could almost imagine the approaching shadow, seeing it in his mind’s eye – or perhaps, it was just the Fifth, playing games with him.

Shen stood beside him, the two brothers shoulder to shoulder for the first time in years. They didn’t know how the Calamity would affect demons – or half-demons, for that matter, but Zed knew he would fight it in any way he could. He may not believe in balance, but that didn’t mean he wanted the whole world razed to the ground.

And he knew without even speaking to Shen that he thought the same. For the first time in a long time, Zed and Shen were hearing the same battle cry, moving to the same rhythmic roar of the war drums. He could imagine the presence of his brother at his back, blades whistling through the air as the pair faced down extraordinary odds.

They were Zed and Shen, Master of Shadows and Eye of Twilight.

Together, they made extraordinary look easy.

**Author's Note:**

> \- kennen once asked zed if he was a shady person. of course he’s shady, he’s master of shadows!  
> \- hahaha ai calling shen ‘eye’ hahaha they sound the same, ‘ai’ and ‘eye’  
> \- finally i have put this out into the world. i can stop thinking about it now. i literally procrastinated this for _three years_ can you _believe_
> 
> hope you enjoyed!


End file.
